REVIVE ME無限復活
A woman finds a weird way to keep her marriage fresh in this Japanese comedy. By KEVIN MA
在這部日本喜劇裡一名女子以古怪的方式來令婚姻保持新鮮感。撰文：馬樂民
IF EVER THERE
was an award for ‘most descriptive title’, the sure winner would be When I Get Home, My Wife Always Pretends to be Dead.
As advertised, this Japanese comedy is indeed about a man who returns home every day to find his wife playing dead.
But it’s actually more than that. The film’s origins are as unlikely as its title: in 2010, a distressed husband submitted an anonymous query on Yahoo! Answers describing the aforementioned scenario. The story subsequently went viral, becoming the subject of a Vocaloid song (created using singing voice synthesiser software) and a three-volume comic book series that expanded the letter into a fictional story.
Directed by Toshio Lee, the film follows Jun (Ken Yasuda), an exhausted salaryman who’s on his second marriage, this time to the much younger Chie (Nana Eikura). Jun’s life is turned upside down when Chie begins to stage outlandish, often gruesome tableaux in which she is killed. Eventually, Jun gives in and starts playing along, but he doesn’t seem to understand the method to Chie’s madness.
The biggest challenge for scriptwriter Fumi Tsubota is to create a compelling story out of the amusing but dramatically thin concept. Fortunately, Tsubota avoids the temptation of using a melodramatic twist to explain Chie’s behaviour. As weird as Chie’s ideas get, the film is ultimately an endearing, lighthearted story about how to keep a marriage from going stale. Tsubota cleverly juxtaposes the story of Jun and Chie’s marriage with that of Jun’s co-worker and his wife, whose normality Jun envies.
Lee may be better known for outrageous comedies such as Detroit Metal City – about a goody-two-shoes pop musician who becomes the leader of a death-metal band – but he doesn’t play up the story’s eccentricities here. It might seem weird on the surface, but When I Get Home is surprisingly insightful on the challenges of relationships and the efforts couples need to undertake to keep a marriage alive. 如果有一個「最詳盡戲名大獎」的話，《我老婆日日都扮死》肯定會獲獎。顧名思義，這部日本電影講的，就是一個男人每天回到家裡，都發現他的老婆在扮死。
不過，劇情當然不止這麼簡單。這部電影固然有個令人意想不到的片名，它的出現亦同樣令人意想不到。2010 年，有個苦惱的丈夫以匿名方式在「Yahoo!知識 +」中描寫了上述的情況，這件事後來在網上被人瘋傳，並且成為一首以語音合成軟件 Vocaloid 製作的歌曲的主題；還有人將原來貼文加以擴充，成為一個虛構的故事，並出版了三冊漫畫。
電影版的《我老婆日日都扮死》由李闘士男導演，故事講述被工作弄得勞累不堪的白領阿淳（安田顯飾）再婚，娶了年紀比他小很多的千惠（榮倉奈奈飾）。自從千惠每天以稀奇古怪、場面血腥恐怖的方式來扮死之後，阿淳開始擔心起來。他不明白千惠的用意，起初陪老婆一起做戲，結果卻依然無法了解她心底的想法。
對於編劇坪田文來說，最大的挑戰是如何將一個有趣但單薄的概念變成一個飽滿的故事。此外，坪田文亦花了不少心思，努力避免使用戲劇化的轉折來解釋千惠的行為。當千惠扮死的主意愈來愈古怪時，觀眾最
終發現，這其實是個輕鬆而動人的故事，講的是如何令婚姻經常保持新鮮感。坪田文巧妙地將阿淳與千惠，以及阿淳的同事夫婦的婚姻交織對照，後者的正常婚姻生活經常令阿淳羡慕不已。
李闘士男也是另一部荒唐怪誕喜劇《爆粗 BAND 友》的導演，這部電影講述純情流行歌手誤打誤撞被唱片公司捧為死亡金屬樂隊的主音歌手，不過卻沒有過分強調故事中怪異的一面。至於《我老婆日日都扮死》雖然故事表面上看來古怪，但卻出乎意料地對夫婦如何維持婚姻關係別有見地，惹人深思。 FIND WHEN I GET HOME, MY WIFE ALWAYS PRETENDS TO BE DEAD IN MOVIE (ASIAN CINEMA) ON THE INTERACTIVE MENU於互動選單的電影（亞洲映畫）觀看《我老婆日日都扮死》